1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a parallel processing system by a multiprocessor, in particular, it relates to a parallel processing system by an OS for single processor capable of operating the OS and an existing application for single processor on a multiprocessor and achieving parallel processing by the multiprocessor with respect to the application.
2. Description of the Related Art
In data processing devices such as mobile terminals including mobile phones and mobile PCs, in the current situation, an operating system for single processor (hereinafter referred to as OS for single processor) and an application for single processor (hereinafter simply referred to as application) are basically executed on a single processor.
In such a situation, if the application is to be used as-is on a multiprocessor basis, it is necessary to execute the application on an OS for multiprocessor instead of the OS for single processor.
As systems that control the execution of OSes and applications for multiprocessor on multiprocessor systems such as the one described above, prior arts are disclosed, for example, in the Japanese Patent Laid-open No. Heisei 3-257652 and Heisei 3-113563.
The Japanese Patent Laid-open No. Heisei 3-257652 discloses a method for controlling the interruption between each processor element in a multiprocessor system consisting of a plurality of processor elements.
The Japanese Patent Laid-open No. Heisei 3-113563 discloses a method for scheduling processes assigned to a plurality of processors in a multiprocessor system.
However, when an existing application is operated on the OS for multiprocessor as in the prior art, there is the problem that the OS for multiprocessor provides services for multiprocessor regardless of the fact that the application uses only one among a plurality of processors, or it proceeds with processing the exclusion of the other processors regardless of the fact that other applications are not operating, such that these extra processing lead to overheads.
Moreover, if the application were modified for use with a multiprocessor, the above problem would be solved, however, it would lead to a different problem that considerable labor and cost would be necessary for the modification.
Furthermore, when the application is used as-is on the existing OS for single processor, there is a high demand that the existing application be operated as-is on a multiprocessor.